by Ron Ripley
“Leanne,” he said, “I don’t know that you can. You are a remarkably vibrant woman, but I fear that in this situation, even Victor is going to have far too much to handle when we confront Korzh.”
Her smile was cold and hard.
“You are right, my young friend,” she said, finishing her tea, “and that is why I had said in my own way. I cannot be there, but another friend will be there in my stead. I need you to bring him with you. And he, in turn, will find Korzh faster than either of you. He has some definite skills that we lack.”
“And what are those?” Jeremy asked, confused.
“Consider my friend to be a finely trained hound,” Leanne said. “Korzh will be hiding, of that we are all in agreement. My friend will be able to use his skills to root the man out. Now, is this course of action acceptable, Jeremy?”
“Of course,” Jeremy said, nodding. “You needn’t have worried on that account, Leanne. So long as he can handle himself when the situation arises, I don’t think we’ll have any sort of issue whatsoever.”
“I thought not,” Leanne said, nodding her approval.
Jeremy finished his tea, placed the cup on its saucer on the table and asked, “Now, who am I bringing with me to Pennsylvania?”
Leanne’s smile remained hard as she called out over her shoulder, “Jean Luc!”
Chapter 8: Not Forgotten
Mike Armstrong didn’t mind a little pick-me-up every now and then. Usually, he managed to get high from pills he bought from a dealer down in Norwich, but Mike’s regular guy had been arrested.
And while there weren’t many rules Mike followed in life, one of them was firm and carved in stone.
Never buy from someone you don’t know.
Mike had a habit and a bad one at that. Within two days, he had burned through the meager stash at his apartment, and he realized he had to pick between two bad choices. The first option was to find another dealer. This not only violated a major foundation in his pill-popping life, but it also would prove to be difficult. Most people sold their drugs at an exceptionally higher cost than he was used to paying. The second option was just as miserable as the first, from what Mike could see.
And that option was to steal from his place of employment.
Robbing them would be almost as bad as finding a new dealer.
Almost.
Mike had landed his job at the Ledyard Mental Health facility after a strange death had freed up a position. Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth, Mike had leaped at the opportunity to work there. He hated the smell of nursing homes he had been previously employed at, and he had a suspicion that the women who ended up in the facility would look a lot better than the old ladies he had dealt with on a regular basis.
Not only that, but there was a better selection of drugs at the facility. On occasion, he had snuck a pill here and there, but only to tide him over until he could make a buy.
But scoring a hit off his dealer wasn’t an option any longer.
“Mike,” Dale said, causing him to jump.
“Oh hell, you scared me,” Mike panted, his heart thumping wildly against his chest.
She offered him an apologetic smile and said, “Sorry. I wasn’t trying to.”
“No,” Mike said, smiling, “I know you weren’t. I’m sorry. I get a little jumpy sometimes.”
Dale nodded. “You looked like you were wrapped up in some pretty deep thoughts.”
“Did I?” Mike asked, surprised. “I usually don’t have anything going on in there. Not unless I’m worried about the point spread for the football game.”
She gave him a grin that reminded him of just how pretty she was, and he felt his face redden.
“I don’t believe that for a minute, Mike Armstrong,” Dale said, winking. “Anyway. Can you do me a favor in a little while?”
“Sure,” Mike said, straightening up. “What is it?”
“You know Tom?” she asked.
Mike thought about it for a minute, then nodded. “Yeah. His parents were killed, right?”
Her smile became smaller, and she said, “Yes. That’s him. He’s been having some sleep issues, and I’ve been trying to get him to take some Ativan to help him relax, but he’s pretty resistant to the idea. I don’t know if you could take it to him personally tonight. I’m hoping he might react better to a male. Well, to anyone other than me. He seems to feel the need to push back against any medication I offer.”
“Sure,” Mike said, nodding, “you got it. I’ll bring it to him and try to get him to knock it back. He’s having nightmares or something?”
“Or something,” Dale agreed. “Thanks a lot, Mike. I’ll talk to you about him tomorrow, okay?”
“Yeah, sure,” Mike said, grinning. “You got it, Dale.”
She waved goodbye, and he did the same. When she had left, he started towards the secure wing, where Tom stayed, and then he had an epiphany.
If the kid didn’t want to take his Ativan, then why make him?
Mike had managed to get his hands on Ativan more than once, and he smiled at the memory of how the drug worked. It wasn’t as powerful as Oxy, nor did it have that sharp high of Adderall, but it would do the trick. At least until his dealer got out, and there was almost no way Mike would get caught.
Not as long as Tom didn’t want the medication.
Mike felt a little spring enter his step and he bounced on the balls of his feet as he made his way to the secure wing. He nodded to others he met, waved greetings to a few more, and by the time he got to Alison at the nurse’s desk, he was whistling.
“What are you so perky about?” she asked with a raised eyebrow that was more eye-liner than eyebrow. She was a woman in her forties, who looked as though she was in her early sixties, and dressed as if she was a teenager just let out of a Catholic boarding house.
But aside from all that, she was funny and handled some of the harder patients with surprising tact and ease. Her skin was pale; a testament to years of working the late shift, and her hair was a solid, peroxide blonde.
“Life’s good,” Mike answered. Then, in a conspiratorial tone, he lied, saying, “I had a good run on some numbers with the last game.”
“You need to stop gambling,” she said, jabbing a nicotine-stained finger at him. “And when you’re done doing the rounds, I need a break. Raquel left earlier, and I haven’t had a cigarette since nine. If I don’t get one soon, I’ll set the desk on fire just to get a little smoke in my lungs.”
“Fine,” Mike said, chuckling. “Give me Tom’s meds first. Dale asked me to check on him. Once that’s done, you can get your smoke break.”
“Good,” Alison grumbled. She went to the locked cabinet in the back of the nurse’s station and returned a minute later with a pair of white Ativan tablets. The small, white pentagons stamped with an ‘A’ were contained in a clear plastic cup. “He hasn’t been cooperative, so I’m not giving you any water. You’ll probably just end up bringing them back to me.”
“Yeah,” Mike agreed. “Dale said the same thing. What if he changes his mind?”
“He has a plastic water bottle in his room,” Alison answered. “More power to you if you can get him to take ‘em though.”
“Well, wish me luck,” Mike said, grinning. “I’d like to see the kid start to get better.”
Alison nodded her agreement and Mike left the station. He wandered the hallway, keeping an eye on the cameras located in the corners. At a nook close to Tom’s room stood a water fountain, and Mike knew it was a blind spot. He quickly palmed the pills, popped them in his mouth, and washed the pair down with a gulp of cold water.
Shivering with anticipation, Mike straightened up and continued on his way. In a few more steps, he reached Tom’s door and knocked.
“Come in,” was the surly response, and Mike entered. As soon as the door closed behind him, he tossed the empty plastic cup into the trash bin against the wall and felt the first, pleasing wave of the Ativan high roll over him.
; “How are you, Tom?” Mike asked.
The thin teenager, who insisted on shaving his head each day and had the demeanor of a political prisoner, looked at Mike warily. “Who are you?”
“My name’s Mike,” he answered. “Dale asked me to check on you.”
Tom closed the book on his lap, set it on the bed beside him and said, “You mean she wanted you to come in here and get me to take the Ativan.”
Mike nodded. “You’re a bright one. I figured you didn’t want any more of that hassle, so I popped them in the trash on the way here. I’ll tell everybody you took them. That way you won’t get harassed anymore.”
An expression of cynical surprise darted across Tom’s face, and Mike understood that the boy knew it was a charade.
“And you’ll do this every night?” Tom asked, leaning back against the wall, folding his arms over his chest.
Mike nodded and added, “If you want.”
“Do you want to?” Tom asked, bitterness thick in his voice.
“I do,” Mike answered truthfully.
“Sure,” Tom said with a shrug. “I don’t have a problem with it.”
Mike grinned and said, “Sounds like a plan to me.”
***
Tom watched the short, pudgy man’s face sag slightly, his eyes taking on a faraway look as the Ativan took effect.
“So we’re all set?” Tom asked.
“Hm?” Mike said. “Oh, yeah. We’re good. We’re real good.”
A pleasant smile spread across Mike’s face and he turned around and left the room. When the door closed he relaxed, and allowed himself to consider what had been eating at him for days.
How to get to Stefan Korzh.
Chapter 9: Disheartening News
“You’re driving back?” Victor asked, incredulous.
“Yes,” Jeremy answered, sighing. “As I said, Leanne has asked that I escort someone to the house to assist with the removal of our mutual problem.”
Victor hated the vague conversation, but he understood that Jeremy didn’t want to be overheard and he certainly didn’t want to text it. Neither of those made him feel any better about Jeremy’s sudden agreement in regards to a road trip from Louisiana to Pennsylvania.
“When do you think you’ll get here?” Victor asked, shaking his head and dropping down into a chair.
“Let me see, tomorrow is Wednesday. I’ll leave in the morning,” Jeremy answered, “and I’ll have to make frequent stops. I don’t believe I’ll be there any earlier than Friday evening. Possibly even Saturday afternoon if I have to stop again. My days of long road trips ended in Vietnam.”
“I know, I know,” Victor muttered. “Well, anyway, be safe. Thanks for letting me know.”
“Of course,” Jeremy answered. “I’ll call you tomorrow evening when I reach the hotel. You can let me know then if you have any sort of luck with tracking down all of Stefan Korzh’s properties.”
“Yeah,” Victor said, nodding. “Yeah, I’ll do that. Safe driving, Jeremy.”
“Thank you.”
Victor ended the call and dropped his phone down onto his lap, closing his eyes and letting it sink back against the headrest. His patience had become thinner, and part of him wanted to seek out the assistance of his dead grandfather. But he had never unpacked the mug from his bag in Jeremy’s house in Norwich, and he hadn’t thought to bring it with him to Pennsylvania.
He wasn’t thrilled with the continued, solitary quest for the current residence of Stefan Korzh. Victor had a desire to go, purchase a large amount of gasoline, some basic kitchen matches, and burn down every structure the man may or may not own.
If he could, Victor would burn down the entire state of Pennsylvania to get to Korzh.
No, Victor reprimanded himself. Erin wouldn’t want me to do that. Not at all. She’d hate it. Stop it. Get a grip.
He took several deep breaths to clear his mind and bring his anger under control. His sorrow had transformed itself to rage, and each day the struggle was worse.
As his mouth formed a hard line, Victor pushed himself up and out of the chair, his wounded hand throbbing with the rising of his blood pressure. He walked across the room to the battered kitchen table that served as a desk. From the scarred top, he picked up a single page. He had printed it out earlier, and he had hoped to go with Jeremy to the various houses to see whether or not Stefan was living in one of them.
Jeremy, Victor knew, did not want him to explore alone.
What he wants and what he gets are two different things altogether, Victor thought bitterly. He strode to the door, took the car keys down and left the house. The paper with the addresses was clenched in his fist. He needed to know if they were close to Stefan, or if the killer had gotten away again.
Chapter 10: Borrowing a Pen
Bob Gilmore cleaned offices. He scoured bathrooms. Vacuums trembled under his steady hand, and the world was cleansed as he passed by.
And he hated it.
Bob had done eight years in prison for armed robbery, and the best job he could get employed with using the skills he had learned there – was how to clean.
Marilyn Whitmore, who ran the cleaning service, had hired him because he and her husband had been friends in high school, and that was the only reason. He had earned her respect eventually by always being on time and never calling in sick, and that was a source of pride for him. Most people assumed that since he had done time, he was worthless.
Bob knew he wasn’t, and he made sure people understood it by observing his work ethic.
These thoughts occupied his mind as he pushed open the inner office door to the insurance agency and entered the owner’s room. Bob flicked on the light, ran the vacuum around the edge of a filing cabinet and felt a tickle on the back of his neck.
It was an old sensation, one that had sprouted up in prison. The feeling was of being watched; as though someone who meant to do him harm was close by, waiting to drive a knife into his chest.
Bob straightened up casually and turned around, eyes roaming over the office, searching the small shadows for someone he hadn’t seen upon entering.
No one was there.
His eyes stopped, then drifted back toward a shelf. On a small display was a golden pen.
It was beautiful.
Bob turned off the vacuum, feeling as though the noise of the machine was upsetting the pen.
Leaving the vacuum by the filing cabinet, he crossed the room to the pen and looked at it. It was stunning; a work of art with long, thin lines etched into the casing. Licking his lips, he lifted his hand, reached for the pen, hesitated, then lifted it up.
The metal was cold beneath his fingers, but a thrill of excitement raced through him as he held it.
I should write something, Bob thought, turning to the desk. He hadn’t written anything since high school, and even then, he had only done so while being punished in detention.
Without thinking, he pulled the chair out from the desk, sat down, and found a yellow notepad. He dragged the pad to him, leaned over it and gently turned the pen’s lower half. The writing point appeared and he smiled, a soft, almost bitter scent rising up from the metal.
Bob started to write, the pen gliding across the paper and leaving a trail of words behind it. The penmanship was magnificent, and nothing like Bob had ever written before. Sentences, long and perfectly crafted, flowed, and they made up his thoughts. His memories. He knew it, even though he had forgotten it.
For several minutes, he wrote in a daze, not quite sure what he was writing. When he finished, his hand and forearm ached dully. Bob had covered the entire page and part of another. His mind thrummed, and he held the pen loosely in one hand as he flipped back to the first page. He settled back into the chair, picked up the notebook, and read what he had written down.
I remember when I was eighteen years old. I had just gotten my license, and my father had allowed me to take out his 1958 Ford pick-up to take Kathryn Moltke on a date.
Bob chuckled, n
odding. Damn, he thought, I’d forgotten all about that.
Still grinning, he read on, curious to see what else the pen had inspired him to remember.
Kathryn and I got a little too tipsy that night. She had stolen some Kentucky bourbon from her parents and hadn’t been able to say yes or no when I was ready for her.
Bob’s grin vanished and his stomach twisted. He wanted to argue with himself that what he had written wasn’t true, but he knew it was. His mouth went dry, and he continued to read on.
I helped her up to her house, put her on the porch in the swing, and left her there to sober up on her own. I took the long way home, cut through Colchester and Cambridge, down through Putnam and over through Dell. It was late. Almost two in the morning. There had been a fellow out hitchhiking.
Bob shuddered and shook his head, trying to take his eyes away from the words, but he couldn’t. He was locked onto them as if someone kept his eyelids pried open and his head straight.
The words marched on across the page.
I don’t know if he was drunk or sober, but I know I was drunk when I hit him, and I hit him hard. His body flew out into the middle of the road. I remember his sneakers, dark blue Adidas, on their sides at the street’s shoulder. The man wasn’t dead. He tried to get up, to his feet. I remember how white his socks were, how his right leg was bent wrong and how the left just wouldn’t hold his weight.
He kept falling down, and I sat there, watching, the big old V8 engine of that Ford rumbling and thrumming. Then I dropped the truck into low, eased forward, and hit him again. I backed up, and he tried to get up. Three more times I hit him. On the fourth time, he didn’t move. That’s when I backed up a good fifty feet, did a brake-stand and raced out over him.
